“We lived through a mudslide, a flood, a fire and an earthquake, and we were living on 20 bucks a day”: Lzzy Hale looks back on the industry mishaps and natural disasters Halestorm endured to make their first album

Halestorm singer/guitarist Lzzy Hale has looked back on the wild circumstances the hard rockers survived to make their 2009 debut album, which included their producer stepping down, their A&R representative being fired and the band surviving a flood, a mudslide and an earthquake in Los Angeles.

In a snippet taken from an upcoming episode of the Heavy Stories podcast, Hale, who co-founded her band with her drummer brother Arejay in 1997, remembers: “We had driven into L.A. [from their hometown of Red Lion, Pennsylvania] for the first time, just to try and find a producer and maybe do some writing there, get inspired.”

However, things quickly went awry, with the band’s first choice of producer dropping out of the sessions. Then they found themselves up against “the industry changing into digital, therefore our A&R guy at the label got fired”.

“We were still stuck in California and couldn’t afford to go home,” she adds. “We lived through a mudslide, a flood, a fire and an earthquake. We were living on about 20 bucks a day, and every time something like that would happen, we would take what little dollars that we had and we would go down to the corner store and get the cheapest bottle of $5 champagne.”

She explains that it was the toasts the band would make with their bargain-basement booze that got them through all the stress and uncertainty. “No matter what, it’s the four of us against the world – here’s to us!” she recalls the members saying. “And we would do that every time, just to keep the morale up and be like, ‘Are we crazy for doing this? Probably! But what else are we gonna do?’”

The band’s perseverance would quickly pay off. Preceded by the successful lead single I Get Off, Halestorm was a moderate chart hit, reaching number 40 on the US Billboard 200 and number 11 on the Top Rock Albums chart. Their second album, 2012’s The Strange Case Of…, furthered their success, topping the Billboard Hard Rock Albums chart. Its single Love Bites (So Do I) won the 2013 Grammy Award for Best Hard Rock/Metal Performance.

Halestorm released their sixth album, Everest, to positive reviews and widespread chart success (including a number one spot on the UK Rock & Metal Albums chart) last year. Hammer’s Dannii Leivers gave it four stars out of five and wrote: “There are moments here that will delight fans and undoubtedly become new live show mainstays-and with new flavours abounding in the mix, it’s their most exciting, eclectic album yet.”

The band will kick off a headlining tour of Central and South America next week, starting with a date at the Pabellón Del Palacio De Los Deportes in Mexico City on Tuesday, March 24.

After that, the band will play at Download festival in the UK in June, before embarking on an intimate acoustic tour of the country later that month. They have US dates booked for July and September, as well. See all of their live plans via their website.